I flew down to Guatemala City on March 28 to cover the story of Emily Samantha Ruiz, a 4-year-old Long Island girl who, despite being a US citizen, was sent to Guatemala when her grandfather was deported earlier this month.
A little more than a day after my arrival, Emily was reunited with her family on Long Island. But instead of heading back home to New York, I decided to stay in Guatemala for the rest of the week and seek out stories similar to that of Emily.
Several local migration experts guided me to San José Calderas, a village populated by former residents of Postville, Iowa, a town best known for 2008 immigration raids that devastated its economy. Along with the adults from Postville, I met some of their US-citizen children, whose lives were much different than they would have been in the US.
Listen to the slideshow below to hear more about the families that I interviewed in Calderas:
